FYS 16 Rhetorical Agency and Cultural Production from the Asian Diaspora
Asian immigration in the U.S. holds a specific history in relation to other migrant or racialized groups. Stock narratives of Asian identity are often constructed under the model minority myth and U.S. exceptionalism, relegating Asians as forever foreigners in the U.S. imaginary. In response to these constricting narratives that have escalated anti-Asian violence and hate speech during the Covid-19 pandemic, students will explore the cultural production of texts from the Asian diaspora that have responded to such rhetoric. We will analyze writing as a practice that is socially constructed by people across time and space and within specific cultural contexts, a theoretical lens situated in the field of Composition and Rhetoric and Writing Studies. This lens focuses on what texts do, placing the authors of such text as having agency and driven by the social relationship within their community. To do this, students will learn methods to analyze not only print texts, but also texts that are multimodal. For example, students will read and analyze short stories, essays, film, counterstories and texts written from the Asian diaspora in response to social injustices. Open only to first year frosh.